Better Presents Come from Friends
by Jateshi
Summary: Christmas is always a time to give your friends maybe not what they want, but what they need Remus does just that. SR, G.


**Title**: Better Presents Come from Friends  
**Pairing**: Sirius/Remus  
**Fandom**: Harry Potter  
**Rating**: G  
**Word Count**: 1,018  
**Warnings**: Light fluff, two men kissing...you know, the usual.  
**Disclaimer**: I neither own Sirius nor Remus, even if I wish I did. J. K. Rowling still has all the rights and I'm simply poor and sick and have markers. Don't sue, I like my markers!  
**Summary**: _Done for the 30kisses challenge and using prompt #5, 'Ano sa...' (Hey, you know...)._  
Christmas is always a time to give your friends maybe not what they want, but what they need - Remus does just that.  
**Author's Notes**: Slightly edited (look, more words!) with a good pointer from Fatamorrigain (on LJ) that it was needed. Thanks so much!

**Better Presents Come from Friends**

Sirius once had liked Christmas, before he'd gone to Hogwarts. Liked wasn't exactly the right term, since saying he 'liked' the holiday would imply that he enjoyed the family gathering held at his ancestral home, that he enjoyed the teasing and insulting of his older ("Respected," his mother corrected any time she heard him mutter under his breath about them) relatives and everything that they brought with him; he didn't enjoy _that_ part of the holiday. Instead he enjoyed what every child, no matter what their blood or background, tended to like Christmas for - presents; presents were the way even a not-quite liked child got spoiled and the way the odder family members could enthusiastically single someone out for a more meaningful gift. He'd been a child like any other during those times - he'd embraced the holiday spirit, put-up with the extra snide remarks that accompanied the guests, and waited for his presents. 

There'd been his wand, a present from his proud parents that yet again, the Black blood had produced another child for Hogwarts. Before that, he'd been given a tightly-woven wool cloak spelled to be lightweight, a mock wand to do child's spells on so that he could be ready to do the family name proud when his letter arrived (because he was a Black and of course it would come to him), and a pile of books. The family tune changed when he was Sorted, as Sirius had expected it would once _he_ got over the shock of being a Gryffindor himself, and Christmas wasn't quite the fun time it used to be. 

Instead of family treasures, which now went by owl to his younger brother who got properly sorted, as his mother loved to remind him, he was given the barest minimum to maintain family face. No prize heirlooms would be given to the sheep of the Black family - better save them for the one they now wanted to be heir, Regulus. That was the start of Sirius learning about _friends_ though, because when his roommates - James Potter, Peter Pettigrew, and Remus Lupin - saw he got just about nothing their first Christmas together, they decided to change it. After all, they reasoned, Sirius wasn't such a bad guy once you got him off that half-hearted rant about Blood and Heritage and Muggles. In fact, as James was thrilled to find, he was a pranking genius who could sweet-talk Remus into helping them with the more complicated steps of a joke. 

So the second Christmas 'round Hogwarts, James presented him with a hand-written book (The Prankster's Guide to Hogwarts, compiled by one James Potter), Peter had a stack of Chocolate Frogs for him, and Remus had a few replacement potions ingredients since his last prank idea had destroyed his supply of witchfoot. And Sirius admittedly was pole axed, since presents came from family members (who weren't about to give him anything more than necessary) not classmates - not 'friends' as they assured him with a laughing smile that didn't aim to humiliate him. 

It was a sort of tradition now between them all to come up with the best present for each other, the one you just _knew_ the other wouldn't ask for but needed. Sirius came up with a dictating quill which could translate into three languages for Remus (it wrote Runes, in the very least, even if Sirius wasn't quite sure it really could write Latin like he'd hoped, since the one time he'd tried it out it seemed more like backwards Latin than the real stuff Remus preferred), a certificate to Hogsmeade for Peter, and a miniature Map for James. Pocket sized, since their real one had gotten seized by Filch, and James still wanted to have one. And in return he had a pile of things from James and Peter, although Remus had just given him a coy smile and said he had to wait. 

James and Peter were off that night - James trying to give Lily Evans, his crush, a present which Sirius knew wouldn't earn him anything but her ire if she did take it and Peter scampering in the direction of Hogsmeade with a bright gleam in his eye. Remus had vanished some time during the afternoon and Sirius was in a light doze when the door to their dorms pushed open, the Gryffindor returning with a pleased and warm smile on his face. He cleared his throat, Sirius blinking awake at the unfamiliar sound to stare directly into a pair of amber-orange eyes just above his reclined body, a flush colouring his cheeks as his dog-honed nose noted the pleasing scents of pine and chocolate wafting around Remus. 

"Hey Sirius," Remus was flushed red too, he picked out, "Do you know..." And then he stopped, taking a breath and Sirius _waited_ for him to continue. "Do you want your present," he rushed in a single breath of air, seeming to go even redder at the suggestion that Sirius barely understood. But he nodded yes, _waiting_ for Remus to show him just what he would get, and then he got it. 

A feather light touch, a calloused pad of a thumb tracing the lines of his jaw before Remus was leaning over him, something entirely new in the kiss he gave Sirius. He started to pull away but Sirius saw the movements before he got far enough, an unforeseen hand hooking onto Remus' patched robes and his head lifted up for a returning kiss. He'd been waiting for _this_ since Remus had caught him riffling through James' old love letters, even if he hadn't quite known it until now. 

"Best present," he murmured and was rewarded by Remus going even more scarlet, the boy about to stammer something out and Sirius deciding to do what he did best - to act on impulse and instinct and deal with the consequences later. He held tight, a firm but gentle grip telling Remus that now - maybe only for now, knowing his tendency to go from shag to shag - that this was good. 

---- 


End file.
